Creation began on 08-06-18
Creation ended on 08-26-18
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Hope from the Sky: Defend to Defeat, Defeat to Defend
Armisael wasn't making this easy at all for Shinji. Even as the Eva moved through the streets and to a clearing where an old war had been fought, evading people and only causing damage to the pavement by walking and running, the Angel hadn't followed it; it was like it was reading the boy's mind and refusing to fall for any games where it would be lured into a false sense of security.
"Shinji, this ring of light that you're seeing," went Kaede to him over the intercom, "it's one of those things we fought together, isn't it?"
"That's what I'm afraid it is, Kaede," he responded, "and if it is, I may have to forget about Plan 'B' and improvise a Plan 'C' because I have no idea what this one can do."
"Just do what you can, Shinji," Historia urged him. "Whatever it is, your best will be whatever you choose to do…but be careful. I get the feeling Kaede here would declare war on your world if something happened to you."
"And we don't know about spaceflight yet," went Ymir, as though this were a joke. "Uh, there is such a thing as spaceflight, right?"
"Yeah," he answered her. "It was developed in my world in the mid-Nineteen-Fifties and got better during the sixties when people were able to get to the moon."
Suddenly, the Angel shifted its form from a ring of like into…something akin to a nine-ended whip in the air…and lashed out on the buildings as it flew towards Unit-01!
-x-
Most of Central Dogma saw the Angel change its form and attack the town before attacking the Eva. The collateral damage was most likely minor (or as minor as modern-age people saw with buildings and small lives that were ruined or harmed, respectively), but the real damage that was to come would be through the battle between the Angel and the Eva.
"Any guess on what type of Angel this one is?" Misato asked Ritsuko, just as the light-like Angel pierced Unit-01 on all sides. "Shinji…"
"Most likely one that encroaches," the faux-blond woman suspected. "It's attempting to invade the Eva."
-x-
Gasp! Shinji, who should've been in the plug when the Angel made contact with the Eva, found himself standing within a vast place that looked like an ocean within a large room. Maybe he was tripping or the Angel had an ability to cause death instantaneous, but the young man felt he was either one or the other and he just didn't know which. The fact that his environment was tinted in the familiar orange of the LCL didn't help to bring any sense of clarity to his conscious right now.
"Where am I?" He wondered, and the place shifted a little as small forms rose up from the water-like terrain, making it seem like a small meadow because said forms resembled small hills surrounding him. "Am I dead?"
"No," he heard a male voice say to him, "but you're going to wish you were."
Something new rose up in front of him. It was a person, another young man, dressed in the exact same plugsuit as Shinji, with dark hair obscuring his eyes; if he didn't know any better, Shinji would assume that he was set to engage in a conversation with none other than himself.
"Who are you?" He asked the young man that stood waist-deep in the orange-colored water. "Are you the Angel?"
"Angel?" He echoed, looking up and revealing all but his eyes that his face was exactly like Shinji's, only worn, partially withered by premature wrinkles across his eyes and cheeks. "The beings you never truly understood, that you try to compare to beings you know of only from a perspective that is meant to be positive. Yes. An Angel, I am. Why do you fight for people you have no business protecting from people out to get them?"
"The Eldians? I swore an oath to protect them from harm against the Marleyans. Even if they're not my people, they are my people now."
"You should've returned to your world when the opportunity to do so presented itself."
"So I'm told and have often thought, but every time that happens, I make the choice to stick by the Eldians. I'm not perfect. I'm flawed, I'm not a cruel person and I don't like the possibility of having to take people's lives. But I stand by my choice to side with the Eldians until my final breath, no matter what I have to do."
"You are as hopeless as the people you fight for are hopeless."
"I'm getting real tired of someone telling me that my mistake was siding with the Eldians when it was my choice. And they are not hopeless. They are never hopeless…and hope isn't denied to anyone just because of something that happened long ago. Hope is something that belongs to everyone, regardless of wherever it comes from, whoever it is that promises it to those that don't have it."
"And what is hope to you? What is hope…to someone viewed as hope incarnate by a bunch of people that will die in the future, one way or another?"
"To me, hope is people smiling, laughing, having fun, looking forward to the next day and not fighting for anything. That is hope to me."
"Your feeble mind is very pathetic."
"I consider myself to be very simple. I don't try to ask for much from anyone."
"And you follow the will of this young woman you didn't know was royalty until after she was found out. In addition, you have bonded with this girl that is as damned as you are, able to become a giant of unfathomable potential…and will only lead you to a despair worse than what should be dealt to you."
"I'd rather follow Historia and be in a committed relationship with Kaede than be without either of them. Anyone who says any different is just full of themselves and thinks without a heart."
The strands of hair fell from the Angel's copied guise to reveal eyes as white and horrendous as what Shinji had seen in the Titans, and his expression was hollower than ever before.
"I'll turn your hope into despair before you die," the Angel told him, and then wasted away.
FLASH! Shinji was blinded by intense light that hurt.
"Aaah!" He yelled.
When it ceased, he was looking at a different world around him. It looked like he was back in Tokyo-3, but all the buildings were either damaged, leaning sideways or scattered all over uneven streets. And up in the air, nine, vulture-like beings were circling the place as if it were nothing more than a carcass laid out to be picked over.
"Shinji?" He heard a voice behind him, sounding like Kaede's, and turned around.
"Kaede… Aaah!"
It was her, but she was completely wasted! Her skin barely covering her face, her left arm missing from her body, and her stomach's innards spilling onto her legs.
"Shinji, why were we Eldians all forsaken by the world we lived in?" She asked him, raising her disfigured right hand up to his face, revealing that it was reduced to just a thumb and pinky finger. "Why were you taken from us so suddenly? We promised we'd be together."
"No," he uttered to himself, shaking his head. "No, this isn't real. You're not real. You're not Kaede. You're just an illusion."
"Without you, we were helpless," she told him. "We were attacked on all sides by Marley. And your father was helping them! He gave aid to the enemy to spite you! I tried to defend us, but we were overwhelmed. Those bombs you told us about, the N² bombs, he gave them to Marley, and they dropped them all over Paradis. I was only able to save Historia and a few orphans, but we were captured. Look at what they did!"
The world around Shinji shifted to show Paradis Island in a state barrenness. Everything was gone. The coastal city, Shiganshina, Trost, even the small villages that once dotted out the inside of the former Walls, all of it was gone. Nothing remained.
"Shinji?" He recognized Historia's voice, and saw her back facing him as she sat in what looked like a rocking chair.
"Historia?" He responded, approaching her.
"They killed Ymir in front of me," she uttered, and he saw her face vacant and devoid of emotions that indicated life, "and the Marleyans found out about my royal blood. They believed they could still claim the Founding Titan through me and used me! Look at what they did to me, Shinji! Look at what people like your father did to me!"
"Aah!"
Her hurt face did her no justice to what was done to the rest of her. Her legs were gone, her hands were withered to the bone, and her belly was swollen in an advanced state of pregnancy.
"At this point in my life, death would be the greatest mercy ever granted to me!" She cried.
Then she crumbled to dust in front of him.
"No," he gasped, and felt a hand grab his left leg. "No…"
Looking down, he saw at least five orphans, three girls and two boys, all withered and mangled, lying all around him.
"They tortured us, Mr. Shinji," the girl grabbing his leg revealed to him. "They took advantage of us because you weren't there to protect us."
"They laughed at how you gave us hope," a boy with half his face messed up added, looking at him with only one eye exposed to the world. "You were our hope from the sky…and then you were gone in an instant."
"Your father and Kaede's step-grandfather poured their drinks of blood water over our bodies," another girl, this one without a head and just an open hole in her chest, told him. "They turned our hope into despair. Why were we forsaken, Shinji? Why?"
"No, no," Shinji refused to accept any of this as real; this was nothing but an illusion, the Angel messing with his head. "None of this is real! None of this is real!"
But as he fell to his knees, he felt as though he had failed the lives of over a million souls that made up Paradis' population. He felt as though the hope he gave them had been short-lived because he wasn't there to help them, how he had dishonored his oath to Historia and failed Kaede by losing to those that threatened to hurt them all.
"Please, forgive me," he uttered. "I didn't mean to fail you."
-x-
The Eva, suspended in the air by the Angel, had turned from purple to a fossilizing gray color, its armor looking as though it was cracking and resembling stone.
People close enough to see this phenomenon happening, both Marleyans and Eldians alike, were in suspense at what this creature of light had done to the giant that had said it was an ally to the Eldians of Paradis.
"Is the giant…dying, Mommy?" An Eldian girl asked her mother, afraid.
"I'm not sure, baby," she responded.
-x-
Kaede watched helplessly as the members of the Garrison endowed with new knowledge were able to improve the video imagery of where the Eva was, seeing the interior of the Entry Plug as Shinji, initially resisting the might of this Angel as it attacked him, starting to look as though he were wasting away and his veins protruding from under his body.
It's killing him, she thought, wanting to do something, wanting to help him, wanting him to come back to Paradis alive, but there was nothing she could do…
And then…
"Kaede?" Ymir went as the girl passed out. "Miss Sogen!"
In the darkness of a forest, Kaede found herself standing in front of a crouched Shinji against a tree, muttering something.
"Shinji," she uttered, approaching him. "Shinji, I'm here!"
"I'm sorry," she heard him say. "I'm sorry."
"Shinji, that Angel's messing with your head! Whatever you think happened hasn't happened yet. You can still stop it!"
"I failed you, Kaede. I failed Historia. I failed everyone."
"Stop it, Shinji! You haven't failed anyone! I'm still here! I'm right here! Please, look at me!"
Shinji raised his head up, revealing to her his face had aged prematurely, giving him a worn appearance with dark circles under his eyes.
"Shinji," she went, holding his head against her chest. "Please, you have to fight back against the Angel. You have to come back to Paradis, to me. Please, fight back."
"I can't," he uttered. "I can't reach the Eldians on Marley unless I deal with the Marleyans…and I can't deal with the Marleyans if I can't beat the Angel. I know none of what I saw is real…but I can't escape the feeling of dread. I can't escape the feeling of failure."
I have to do something, she thought, desperate to save his fighting spirit. "Try to hold on, Shinji. I'll try something I just thought of. If I can keep in touch with you through the Founding Titan and spread knowledge to random Eldians connected to the Founder through these unseen paths…then maybe I can go further than that. The Founder is supposed to be connected to everyone of Eldian descent, right? I'll use it to reach out to the ones all over Marley."
"You…you don't know if that is possible…or what it could do to you."
"So long as I'm with you…I won't fear the outcome…so let me hold you. You're my pillar, my anchor, my hope."
Shinji raised his left arm up…and gripped Kaede's left arm, trying to hold onto her as tightly as he could.
"What the Hell's going on here?" Kaede heard a man's voice, and saw a man dressed in a suit appearing in front of them. "How'd I get here?"
"Where's my mom?" She saw a young girl in a brownish dress say.
Within moments, Shinji and the forest disappeared, leaving Kaede in the presence of what had to be the greatest number of Eldians she had ever seen in her life. All around her, left, right, up, down, back and forth, were countless Eldians as far as the eye could see. Men, women, children, infants, all looking at her as she stood in front of her Dark Titan as it floated behind her, sheltering her in its arms.
"Are you all Eldians?" She asked them. "Are you all Subjects of Ymir Fritz?"
They all frowned upon her; she could feel their disgust towards the woman that had, as they most likely believed over the years and generations, made a deal with a demon to obtain the power of the Titans. She could feel the animosity of their combined hatred towards the ancestral harbinger of the Eldians' former empire.
Shinji, Mother, Father, Sig, please, give me strength, Kaede thought as she made her Titan place its hands to its side so she could face the people. "Please…I only ask to say what I need to say to all of you. After which, say or do what you will and I won't try to stop you."
There were murmurs and whispers going around for an undetermined amount of time before a response came from one of them.
"Yeah," a man dressed in rags responded, "we're Eldians, all around the world, forced to live in internment zones, constantly reminded of the sins of our people."
"What is it to you?" A woman in a white dress asked her, holding a baby in her arms.
"A young man in a purple giant that has shown up in Marley is faced with difficulty because he wants to bring balance to the nations of Marley and Eldia. The Eldians of Paradis, including the new queen, look to us both as hope between the two nations. We have possession of seven of the Nine Titans of Ymir Fritz, and we need the remaining two to bring us closer to the desired goal, but he doesn't want to hurt any of you. You might've heard terrible things about us from the island, but…"
"THE FIRST KING ABANDONED US!" They all yelled at her, sounding and looking like a swarm of flies as they enveloped her and the Dark Titan. "THE MARLEYANS CONDEMNED US TO DEATH EACH DAY! WE'RE ALL HISTORY BECAUSE OF HIM! BECAUSE OF PARADIS! BECAUSE OF YOU! WE DON'T NEED ANY MORE FALSE HOPE! WE NEED NOTHING FROM YOU!"
Kaede closed her eyes and responded, "If that's true, then my boyfriend and I made a mistake and we should both die. I'm sorry for what Karl Fritz did to us all, but he no longer has any say in our fates. We decide our own fates now. Shinji, the man inside the purple giant right now, he helped us break free from the past to reclaim our future. He gave the people of Paradis hope, and we can do the same for all of you…but only if you truly want it. Only if you believe you truly deserve it, no matter what everyone else says, thinks or believes."
The Eldians calmed down and backed away, and then a pregnant Eldian woman floated over to her, her hands holding her swollen belly as she wore a black dress.
"I have seen the purple giant," she revealed. "If what the man inside says is true, and he is affiliated with the people of Eldia, with Paradis, then why does he side with us? Why does he give hope to those that have none?"
"He saw the Colossal Titan attack us one day…and chose to save us."
Flash! A scene of Unit-01 fighting the Colossal Titan played itself in front of each of them, followed by it fighting and eating other Titans, being viewed as hope by the people, protecting them from an indirect enemy when the real enemy was the people that hated them for the actions of their ancestors.
"What do you people of Paradis want from us all across the world?" A little boy asked her.
"We want the injustice to stop, but we don't want to fight with Marley," she answered him. "Even though there are people that we can't forgive for their crimes, the number is few…and wars solve nothing. Wars just…"
"Make things worse," a man said. "Except that that's all Marley truly cares about. Ever since the First King renounced war and allowed them to rise up against our ancestors, Marley has been all about conflict and revenge against Eldia…and anyone sympathetic to its people. In their minds, anyone and anything that relates even a little to Eldia, to Ymir Fritz, is a germinating infestation that needs to be eradicated. But they're so consumed by this hatred that they're willing to use the very monsters that they despise to excite fear and hatred in anyone else so long as it condemns us all. It's an obsession of madness with them most of the time."
"They hate us so much," another man said, holding the left of a woman beside him, quite possibly his wife. "So much that they feel people of other nations have to hate us, too. Any that don't, that feel we're capable of change and redeeming ourselves, they declare war upon."
"Forty-two years ago, they went to war with a nation in the west," the woman revealed. "They couldn't convince the government of that nation to support the anti-Eldian goal to exterminate us all…and killed everyone they could. It…didn't matter to them at all who they were, whether they were soldiers defending their country…or a woman that just gave birth to twins less than an hour ago. If you don't hate the Eldians like they do, they kill you. If you support the Eldians, they kill you. Even just suggesting that they talk with Eldians is a death sentence."
"Basically, talking to Marley, ideas of peace between them…isn't possible so long as they're wrapped up in their hatred of us," Kaede realized.
"I once knew a woman that was sentenced to death by Marley…just because her baby was crying. There were rumors of a family burned to death in their own house…just so that the Marleyan soldiers could get back at them for falling down in front of their feet." An old man confessed to her.
One after another, each Eldian revealed to Kaede how impossible it seemed to seek peace with Marley. How the hatred they embraced was so strong that it was all they knew.
The more they despise us for our past and existence, she thought, the more they become like the monsters they see us as.
"There's even an Eldian among the Marleyans that hates us," said a woman to her, "but his hatred is separate from theirs. He just…he just hates us, and he works for them, giving them his aid to the point where they don't consider him an Eldian. They view him as one of their own, someone that despises us to the point of wanting us dead. He's like a demon that looks like us…but isn't one of us. Not anymore."
"This man, this Eldian," she responded, "is his name…Grausam Zanki?"
GASP! Everyone around her gasped; they either knew him or knew of him.
"He's the man that's part of the minority that the new Eldian government of Paradis needs to dispose of…and the only one I want to see dead."
"What is his relation to you, miss?" An elderly woman asked her.
"He's my step-grandfather…and he gave me the power of the Titans against my will. Now, what I once viewed as a curse because I feared what others might do to me if I was found out…has become my blessing because I want to use it to help others, because I found out the truth behind their existence. Ymir Fritz discovered a source of power deep in the Earth that few people ever discover…and even fewer people use upon discovery. It was a source that connects us all to her, and she used it to accomplish many things, even though it caused her to have a shortened life. Even after she died, she still exists because of the Titans, the ones born from her soul. They were her promise to us that we would have prosperity, wisdom and peace…and we can still have those because this is our world, too, not just Marley's or everyone else's."
"Wisdom…"
"Prosperity…"
"Peace for all those that seek it…"
"Who are you?" They all asked her.
"My name is Kaede Sogen… Kaede Sogen of the Dark Titan of Eldia, co-ruling adviser to Queen Historia Reiss, the last, direct descendant of Ymir Fritz, and sole possessor of seven of the Nine Titans of Eldia," she revealed her identity to them, "and I'm asking all of you… No, I am begging all of you… Will you help the people of Paradis Island, the queen herself, my boyfriend, our hope from the sky and I…to end the hatred, to seek out the peace desired by those that want it? Please!"
-x-
"…How much longer can he resist the Angel?" Misato asked Maya as they saw Eva looking more fossilized with each passing minute.
"He doesn't have long," she answered. "The Eva has bio-contamination all over the place."
Inside the plug, Shinji looked like he was ready to throw in the towel of life and move into the beyond where everyone else did upon death.
"Shinji," Misato uttered. Damn it, Shinji, you can't die right now! Even if you never come back here, you have people over there waiting for you! What will happen to them if you die? What about Kaede? She loves you and can't bear to lose you. You give them all hope. Don't end it by going away.
-x-
"Shinji! Shinji!" Shinji heard Kaede as he felt her arms around his upper body once more. "Please, Shinji, you have to get up and fight! You have to come back to us!"
"Everything's…so quiet," she heard him say, sounding like he was about to give up.
"Shinji, please, you can't quit now. Please. I was able to do something impossible because of you, Shinji. I was able to reach out to them, the Eldians, all of them that want what we want. Why, Shinji…why do you feel you should stop now? Why, when we're so close to ending the way things are right now?"
"If I don't…all of you will suffer because of me. Hope becomes despair."
Kaede raised Shinji's face to look at hers, seeing that he was terrified by whatever was going on between himself and this Angel, even though he knew what he was experiencing wasn't real.
"What did you see?" She questioned.
"You all die because my father chose to help Marley hurt you to spite me. They torture Historia after finding out she has royal blood and exploit her. There's nothing left of Paradis. I fail all of you. I fail you. But that's not what tortures me the most, the fact that I lost all of you."
She closes the space between them and says, "It's that you don't see yourself having suffered with us. That monster is only showing you a possibility based on your fears and beliefs of what could happen if you're not there…but it's not showing you your own fate. A world in which you're alive…but by yourself… That is a cruelty you can't escape if it were to come to pass."
"Yes."
"Shinji, none of that will happen so long as you have me, and so long as the Eldians have us to defend their future. We're hope incarnate, you and I. So long as we have each other, we can overcome despair. My greatest despair right now is being without you. I promised I would protect you from those that came after, and it included the Angels. If anything happens to you, then it means I've failed you more than anything."
"Let me tell you something, Shinji Ikari, and it's something I don't normally tell anyone," Shinji recalled a momentary chat he had with Kaede's mother. "I say this not as an Eldian woman or as a mother to a teenager or even as a civilian of a nation reduced to just an island. I say this as one person to another. Now, as you're an adviser to the queen with some authority to rule below her reign, you're also in a position to have whatever it is that you want for yourself, but should you turn away from something your heart truly desires, do you believe you deserve all that you do have? That's the question you must answer for yourself."
If I turned away from something my heart wants, he thought, burying his head in Kaede's chest, thinking about all the things he wanted only with her. "Kaede…if I turned my back on you, and I want you in my life so much, I wouldn't deserve all that I have right now."
"Same here, Shinji," she reminded.
"Wait for me."
-x-
Armisael could feel it happening. It could feel the soul of this abomination's operator slipping away as its body hardened to rock. In just a few more seconds, this mistake would be corrected and nobody would care. It would just be another pile of waste in an indifferent world.
FLASH! The Eva's eyes beneath its armored head flared like crazy as the cybernetic behemoth roared back to life and grabbed the Angel by two of its light threads sticking into it.
"GRRRRRRRAAURGH!" It shrieked, its bone-gray exterior cracking and flaking off to reveal the purple sheen it had restored, making it look like new.
Gripping the light threads tightly, the Eva yanked until they tore from the rest of the Angel, causing it to bleed light.
"AAAAAAURGH!" It shrieked in agony, and the Eva grabbed two more threads and ripped them away, as well. "AAAURGH!"
Inside the plug, Shinji, looking refreshed, frowned at this Angel like it was expecting mercy from him. There was no way he could ever bestow mercy to something as vile as this thing! Being shown despair and realizing his own that came from not suffering alongside the people he cared about was going too far and punishable by being dealt with severely. And this was still an Angel, which made it an enemy. Not his enemy, but an enemy, all the same.
Taking out his Eva's Prog. Knife, Shinji stabbed away at what was left of the Angel, cutting deep into its would-be flesh until it fell to the ground with a harsh slam.
"You made me think it was my fault," he uttered as he continued to hack away at its body, "that I was going to be the cause of their suffering. You made me think I had failed them! That Kaede and Historia suffered because of my involvement! You have no idea of the pain you've inflicted upon me! Die!"
The last bit of Armisael, a dim thread of light, bobbing like a weakened snake, was then stabbed by the Prog. Knife…and reduced to a series of gray threads as big as small buildings and as long as small sections of the Great Wall of China, scattered across the former battlefield.
-x-
Central Dogma was in silence as everything the saw Shinji do showed nothing but the fury of a young man crossed for being preyed upon like that by an Angel.
"Uh, his vitals have all returned to normal, Major," Maya informed Misato about Shinji's current state. "It's as though he weren't attacked to begin with."
"And the Angel?" She asked her.
"The blue pattern is gone."
Once more, Shinji shows us just how powerful his Eva is when fueled by the Titans, Ritsuko thought as she couldn't imagine the Eva restoring itself the way it did like that. What in God's name have we truly made this from and what are these things that give it such power?
"Shinji," they heard a female voice over the intercom from a different radio source, "are you alright? Shinji?"
"I'll be alright, Your Highness," they heard him respond. "I'm just catching my breath."
If Shinji said "Your Highness", then that meant the person he was addressing had to be this Historia Reiss he had sworn an oath to as her adviser. And judging from her voice, she was just as concerned for him as Kaede had been when she had threatened Asuka.
-x-
Kaede awoke from unconsciousness and looked up at Ymir.
"You're finally awake," she uttered, helping the girl up. "Where'd you go?"
"Everywhere," the holder of the Dark Titan expressed. "Marley is a global power consumed by hatred…and the Eldian people scattered across the planet, I was able to reach out to them."
"All of them?" Historia questioned; whether or not Kaede was able to reach out to every last member of the Eldian nation was truly up to interpretation, since there had to be some that she couldn't reach, even with the Founding Titan.
"Only those that truly want for there to be peace between the two nations," Kaede clarified. "There had to be at least a hundred or so, maybe more, that weren't interested in peace at all."
"But the ones that were, the ones you were able to reach," Historia went, "were greater than the ones that didn't?"
"I must've lost count after seeing so many of them, because despite Marley despising us, there are over nine-hundred-thousand people across the world of Eldian descent. Less than a million of them…give or take…but greater than nine-hundred-thousand."
Historia and Ymir looked at each other and couldn't believe there were that many of their people across the world. It was greater than the number of people that lived within the Walls before they were destroyed by Kaede using the Titans within them, less than five-hundred-thousand, give or take, and before Shinji arrived and changed their fates, that number was always dwindling down over the years, either by trying to reclaim lost territory or through other factors. Even if the number of other people from other nations were greater than theirs, just knowing that they were greater than the ones on Paradis was a sign that they weren't as few as they once believed.
"Incredible, Kaede," Ymir told the girl.
-x-
Even though he had defeated the Angel, Shinji wasn't sure if his initial plan to deal with the Marleyans was still possible. While he was still willing to use his alternative plan to let the military waste their ammunition on him to weaken them, he still had to hold onto the hope that it wouldn't be necessary to do so.
-x-
Such power, thought Grausam as he saw as he saw the purple behemoth return to the city. Not even a Titan could do anything against a creature of that sort.
Even if he were to continue his periodic injections of his refined Jaeger Serums to increase his own abilities, Grausam believed there was no way he or any other Titan Shifter could match or exceed the might of this giant. This meant Marley's greatest resource, the Titans themselves, would be compromised, meaning that his services to Marley themselves would be compromised. And it was bigger than anything a Titan could reach; no matter how far the research had gotten, the closest his refined variations in the Titans' height was only fifty-sixty meters. Anything larger than that was a strain without stronger skeletal joints and muscles.
But if we had it on our side, that would be another story, he realized, imagining a different possibility regarding this giant that sided with Eldia. "Whosoever has the most power in life is the one that decides what is what."
And so, he left to find his superiors to ascertain the current situation they were considering with this giant. Once information was shared, the best solution or solutions could be made to resolve the matter effectively.
If there's one thing I've learned above all else since I got here, it's about the way one gains control, he thought as his mind couldn't escape the idea of Marley having the giant under their rule, strengthening their hold on the world. It don't matter if you were born to a royal family or on the streets to filthy peasant. Anyone and everyone has a right to the throne that is to control the nation…if they have the means and the will to take it, however they can.
And what was more was that Grausam had only so few ambitions that he never shared with anyone, and what was perhaps his best one…was to get rid of all traces of Paradis' Eldians once a proper strategic operation had been prepared.
-x-
Once his breath was fully caught, Shinji checked in with the Survey Corps on the carrier and informed them that the unexpected situation that was another Angel had been dealt with.
"Are you sure you can continue with the plan?" Levi questioned after being informed. "You look as though you need to rest more."
"I'm sure," Shinji told him.
Meanwhile, outside the Eva and back in the Marleyan city, as if by the greater will of another person, several dozens of Eldian people began walking down the street out of the internment zone, dropping what they were doing and just going onto the ruins of the former battlefield that was just used by the Angel and the Evangelion.
"Hey, what do you freaks think you're doing?!" A soldier demanded, but the people just ignored him and continued walking out onto the field. "Hey!"
Even the Marleyan civilians were confused about this and wondered what was drawing them towards the giant.
"He doesn't want to fight Marley," a little Eldian girl expressed as she was being carried by her mother. "Is he God, Mommy?"
"No, sweetie, he's not God," her mother explained, "but maybe he could be…if he wanted to, that is."
"No," an elderly man expressed, "he knows that a god is separate from people. Marleyans always say that gods are uncaring…but this giant…is just a servant of a greater will…and has sworn its allegiance to Eldia."
"Just like that girl told us!" A boy cried out.
Inside the Eva, Shinji witnessed something that was unlike what he had seen in his previous times in the plug.
"Uh, Captain Levi, Commander Erwin, Queen Historia," he called through the communication channels linking his Eva to their locations in the carrier and on Paradis, "I have another unexpected factor going on here. There are people walking out of the city and onto the battlefield. They look like regular civilians."
"They're Eldians, Shinji," Historia revealed to him. "Kaede was able to use the Founding Titan to reach out to them all over Marley. Those are some of the Eldians that want to be free from the injustice they've had to live with for years."
"Kaede was able to… You guys never cease to amaze me with what you're capable of."
"But what I found out from them was a harsh truth, Shinji," Kaede told him as she appeared on the screens. "Peace with Marley may be impossible with their current mindset. They're so consumed by their hatred of Eldians that it's been their driving force ever since Karl Fritz chose to give control of the mainland to them and take as many of his people to Paradis as he could. The ones in charge, they attack anyone from any nation that even so much as thinks that we're capable of redemption. It doesn't even matter to them what we do, even if it's a crime or not, whether it's something as cruel as picking a fight with them…or something as trivial as spitting on the ground in their direction. They…seen anything we do as a rule being broken or a crime being committed."
Shinji didn't like this. None of them did. It seemed like the only thing they could do with Marley…was engage them in bloody conflict.
"Is there anyone among Marley that doesn't think Eldian people are cruel demons that deserve death?" He questioned.
"None that they told me," she responded. "Even the nations that had worse opinions about us…they later became disgusted with."
"Disgusted with?" Erwin asked on the other screen. "There were other places that hated Eldians, too, and the Marleyans were okay with that until they decided they weren't, anymore?"
"Apparently, yes."
"What is wrong with them and their hatred for all of you?" Shinji wanted to know. Do they have to be the only ones in existence that hate the Eldians the most? If someone doesn't agree with them about everything relating to Eldia, they kill them? If anyone so much as shows kindness to the Eldians, they declare war with them? It's…it's like a war to see who has the most hatred against the Eldians. They blame the Eldians for…everything.
Shinji looked at the Eldians that had gathered in front of his Eva, noticing the same little boy and his mother that he saw earlier as being among them.
"Kaede," he uttered, "what did you tell them about us?"
"Things have changed where we reside," she explained (A/N: Cue to Bound by Purpose by Twelve Titans Music), "and that hope exists for them…if they want it."
It wasn't much of an explanation, but from the way they had gathered in front of the Eva, Shinji got the impression that his girlfriend told these people that had never been to Paradis or had seen a Titan a day in their lives more than enough to convince them that everything they were led to believe about themselves wasn't entirely true and that they deserved a happy future just as much as much as the Marleyans probably felt they themselves did. How long have they lived under the perception of other people's hatred over them that was related to a past they didn't know the truth about? Why they had to think they were wicked beings when they were truly innocent and had never done anything to deserve any animosity directed towards them?
All around his Eva, the Eldians that were appealed by the promise of hope that existed in front of them…and away from this place. They didn't show fear like they had before; it was still there, but they now knew this behemoth was controlled by a young man that had fallen from the heavens upon them and saw their plight. It was as they had cried out for a hero, a savior…and he was the answer to their prayers.
Stopping in front of the left leg of the Eva, the same boy that Shinji spoke to through the Eva, alongside his mother, lowered to their knees and put their hands together in prayer. And behind them and beside them…the others followed suit, dropping to their knees and raising their hands together, as if praying to the Eva as though it were a sign from a merciful god.
"Why," he questioned to Kaede, "why are they doing this?"
He knew they could see what he was seeing now, and Kaede couldn't help but recall the ancient memory of Karl Fritz's where he was in his Titan form, surrounded by people that his power had been used on to remove their memories of the world beyond the Walls, eliminating their fear of him and the Titans at that time. But the girl knew this was different from then. There were no walls to hide behind…and this was not a Titan with the power to remove their memories. This…was a friend that enabled them to reclaim their place in the world and be free from the chains of their darkened past.
"They want to believe in you, Shinji," said Erwin to him. "They want to believe in hope."
-x-
"…Just how many of the Eldians are left the internment zone?" Calvi demanded to know from one of his subordinates after he was informed of the large number of them venturing out onto the battlefield.
"There are…only seventeen of them that didn't leave the internment, sir," he answered. "The rest of them are in front of this…this thing…and are praying to it now."
This was insanity to Calvi and the rest of the military present. Only seventeen Eldians left in the internment zone…out of its estimated population of five-hundred-twenty-seven…and not a single one was rounded up the soldiers that they walked past! It was an embarrassment to their authority and an insult to their pride!
"Order them to return to the internment zone," he demanded. "Kill them if they refuse."
-x-
"Attention!" Shinji heard a man yell through a megaphone as the tanks from earlier had now gathered outside the city and were aimed at the Eva and the Eldians, accompanied by Marleyan soldiers that raised rifles at them. "You are all in direct violation of Marleyan law! Return to the Acier Internment Zone (A/N: Since Marley has become a global power and most of the lands are ruled by them, there could be more places than just Liberio being mentioned), immediately! Failure to return to the internment zone will be dealt with by deadly force!"
Some of the Eldians turned their heads around to face the Marleyans that had just threatened them…but then turned back to pray to the Eva; they had just come to their own conclusions that, no matter which choice they made, it wouldn't be the right choice to make. They had all been reached by the new keeper of the Founding Titan and they had been offered the chance to take back their lives and future by both this embodiment of hope and the new governing body of Eldia that was not looking to repeat or echo the mistakes made by the First King. They had to believe in the possibility of a future better than what they had right now. They had to believe in it so much that they could grasp it tightly and never let go.
"You have till the count of three to return to the internment zone, you worthless children of the Devil!" The man yelled at them again, making no hint that he was serious about murdering them. "I mean it! One…"
The soldiers took aim…
"Two…"
Tears were starting to fall from the Eldians' eyes, both in fear and in hope for salvation.
"Three!"
But they didn't move. They wouldn't move from where the Eva was.
"Open fire!" He ordered, and the rifles and tanks unleashed a barrage of smoldering steel towards the people they despised.
"NO!" Shinji cried out, activating his AT-Field in defense of them.
There was a long silence. The soldiers continued to unleash their ammunition upon them and the Eva like there was a chance they would strike back the second they relented. It was better to let them have all of the torment they could spend on tearing their bodies to shreds and leaving what was left of them to rot across the ground. There was no mercy, anymore, only contempt.
"Die, you sickening bastards! Die, die!" The man shouted.
A whole minute or so had passed before the rifles and tanks had been spent of their ammo, leaving a wide smokescreen in front of the military group that had unleashed Hell upon their targets. When it cleared, they were met with dread instead of success. There was no open battlefield littered with scattered arms and legs. There were no traces of damage present on the purple giant that was visible. No, all they could see…was that the Eldians and the Eva were unharmed, protected by what looked like a wall of orange light that was in front of them…and the Eva itself having sprouted a series of wings of light from its back.
"What?!" The man had gasped.
The Eva had spread its arms out over the Eldians it had protected…and then the ground started to shake around them.
"You will not harm these innocent lives," Shinji told them as the ground beneath the Eva and Eldians rose up; somehow, even Shinji wasn't sure, but the AT-Field was now affecting the land around the Eva, and he was using to keep the people safe.
It was truly an act of God here. The behemoth…was raising a section of land right out of the ground…and levitating it across the terrain! Not even the Titans could do anything of this magnitude! No, the Titans couldn't do anything of this sort!
-x-
"My God!" Calvi gasped as he could see the Eva floating away from Acier on a patch of the old battlefield with the Eldians that abandoned the internment zone. "What is this thing?!"
-x-
"Unbelievable," went Eren, Mikasa and Armin as they saw the Eva levitating the patch of earth across the air and ocean, moving as though the laws of the world no longer applied to it.
As it flew over the carrier, it suddenly made a strange sound as it was lifted from the water.
"Urgh!" The Survey Corps all went as the ship was now under the Eva's influence.
"Looks like we're all heading back to Paradis," said Levi to Erwin.
"And we're back to a new strategy," Erwin added.
To be continued…
A/N: I originally intended to put a quote I found on YouTube after listening to Bound by Purpose here, but I guess that can go in the next chapter. At this point, both Unit-01 and the Dark Titan, along with their possessors, are evolving beyond their capabilities, metaphorically and literally, able to do things they never thought possible. And at this point, it seems unlikely that Marley has anything in their possession that can affect Eldia short of trying to dominate Paradis on all sides.